Afghan police are searching for a man they say killed his wife for giving birth to a third daughter, rather than a son he had hoped for.

Police in the northern Kunduz province have arrested the victim's mother-in-law in connection with the murder but the husband fled the scene.

Violence and abuse continues to be a major problem for Afghan women, a decade after US-led troops ousted the repressive Taliban regime.

On Sunday, an Afghan immigrant, Mohammad Shafia, his wife and son were found guilty in a Canadian court for the “honor killing” of four female family members.

The three were sentenced to 25 years in prison for the deaths of Shafia's three daughters and first wife in a polygamous marriage. Prosecutors said the teenage sisters were killed because they dishonored the family by defying rules on dress, dating, socializing and going online.

Last month, Afghan police found a 15-year-old bride who had been locked for six months in a windowless room in the basement of her husband's house in northeastern Baghlan province.

She had been beaten and tortured and had her fingernails pulled out because her in-laws tried to force her into prostitution and she refused.